


Even a Worm

by SandrC



Series: One-Shot Wonders [4]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, Dehumanization, Period-Typical Racism, Sort Of, fucking die for my internet dad, i still stan any clint characters, sorry i did gandy like this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-07 08:29:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15904629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandrC/pseuds/SandrC
Summary: Benjamin Stands ain't a good person. Maybe that kid on the train is a test, sent by whatever God may be up there. Maybe its a punishment instead, still sent by whatever God is up there.(A story about Gandy Dancer without really being about Gandy Dancer.)





	Even a Worm

**Author's Note:**

> I love the boys and their refusal to do old-timey racism but...only one of the Dust crew was confirmed white. I had to play with that. I'm actually legitimately sorry.
> 
> The concept of a small Chinese-American child riding the rails in gender-nonspecific clothing is neat but...imagine how odd it'd look. Now imagine how an old-timey racist would feel.
> 
> Sorry for the dehumanizing and racist language directed towards Gandy. It's meant to be a...statement?
> 
> The end of this got away from me. I think I killed it prematurely. That's fine though. I don't mind. It's done and that's all I care about. Also, the phrase even a worm will turn is really good. I love it.
> 
> Warning: racist language towards a child of Chinese heritage, dehumanization of selfsame child, referring to a child as "it", and just...an old-timey racist white fuck.

Now Benjamin Stands weren't a bad man. All things considered, he'd _prolly_ rank on the average for ' _shit that ain't kosher that been done_ ' meter. That being said, he weren't a _saint_  neither. But put poor Benny on a train that's almost abandoned, on his way to a podunk town in the Valley for some errand boy shit for the Greysons and even a worm will turn if given the chance. Specially if the chance is given in the form of a cart with only one other person. Also that person is a small child with neat hair and a pair of well-pressed overalls. And they're staring. _Eerily_ so.

Benjamin also wouldn't consider himself a racist man but...did the kid have to be a slant-eyed chink? Like, for _christssake_. Creepiest of all fucking kids too. _Jeezus_. Fuck.

So here poor Benny is, alone in a train car to fuckall nowhere, with only a creepy child for company, and he bout near shits himself when the kid speaks from near his elbow. He didn't even see the damn thing move! Didn't hear it neither!

"You riding to the end?" The kid stares with slashes for eyes, black and soulless.

" _Ffff_ —where'd you come from?" Benny censored hisself midway through but he figured that the kid knew what he was about coz they fucking smiled like they were in on a secret.

"You saw me on the way in." The kid pointed to the car door, expressionless. They hadn't fucking blinked. "Answer me, if you would be so kind?"

Benny blinked, confused. " _Pardon_?" This kid was... _well spoken._

"My question? You riding to the end of the line? Most folks don't stick in this one unless they're planning on staying past the ditch-point." The kid gestured to the whole car and raised a fuzzy black eyebrow. Looked like a boll-weevil feeler. Made Benny's skin crawl.

"Why's it matter? Matter a'fact—where's your... _folks_?" Benny near let the word _watcher_ slip. That wouldn't do. Old habits die hard but...a kid alone didn't mean they were a...piece of _property_.

The kid pursed their lips, thin strips becoming thinner, save for the cupids bow, which dipped low in spite of their wry smile. "They went to pasture. Pining for greener fields, in fact. I just live with these good railway folk."

_Oh_...fuck...

"The look you're wearing lets me know you didn't figure that." Again, a smile. Benny felt like he was being scrutinized. He _hated_ it. "Not many people think orphan when they see a lone kid like me on the rails. Specially when they only see my _race_." Their soft smile revealed tombstone teeth. They gave Benny the willies.

" _I_ —"

"Again, again with the _excuses_. People just see my age and my race. Be _frank_ , sir, just talk to me like I'm an adult." The way their boll-weevil eyebrows tilted set Benny's hair on edge. "Seen enough death to be one anyway."

_Here_ it was that Benny tried to weigh his options. Either he could continue to talk to this kid and continue to creep himself out or he could leave the car. Neither option was appealing. One meant possibly dying and the other meant admitting defeat.

In the end, the former won over the latter. Benny weren't no loser, _let alone_ one who'd flee from a runt of a kid in a near-empty train.

"Yeah. I'm ridin' the line out." He hissed through clenched teeth.

" _Superb_!" The chink grinned a graveyard again and Benny bit back bile. "What brings you that far out?"

_None a' your business_ , he wants to say. "Greysons" his traitorous mouth replies.

" _Oh_. Hadn't heard the Greysons that far out but—" the kid shrugged, their mouth becoming a third slash in their face. Boll-weevil feelers reached up to something that _might_ be humor? It was hard to suss out. _Fuck_ man...

"Last minute," he adds. _Damn_ him and his loose lips. The Furs down there'd have his head. _Fuck_. Assuming the Law didn't right hang him first.

"Huh," the kid nodded and occupied the seat across from Benny. "Hope you don't mind though. Me sitting here?" The way the kid ducked its head to its seat made Benny think that it didn't matter one mote if he minded. Fucking thing would sit there regardless. The kid took his silence as acceptance and smiled again. Close-lipped, _thank Christ._ Them gravestones made him wonder if death was kinder. No man deserved _that_.

"Mmm," Benny said. He had bitten back on his lip. He didn't wanna scare whatever this kid was. Didn't feel Fur. Didn't look Fang. Didn't dress Church. Didn't speak Law. Didn't move Spook. Didn't seem Flesh. Maybe something beyond. Like them angels. Benny'd never met one of them before. Maybe they all looked like freaky shit kids.

"Wonder if the kerfuffle down at the end is done yet. The Furs and Fangs have been at each other for a bit but the Spooks have been worse." The kid seemed to be making idle conversation now.

" _Kerfuffle_?" _Fuck_. God _dammit_ Benny, don't bite on that shit. That's a baited hook you _ass_.

"Yeah," the kid smiles. "Furs and Fangs down at the end have been on edge. Something about death, as it always is." Its voice flattened then. Death. Didn't like that, did it? "The Spooks though...they're the ones that hold the power in that town. Furs, they can bare their claws till the cows come home but none but the Church can kill the dead. Fangs, well...they're halfway there already. They don't need any more of that shit. One more foot in the grave and they're as good as dust. But the Spooks are there and remain there. They're dead as it gets and they don't like others round that aren't."

"Huh...," now Benny weren't superstitious or nuthin but...a creepy kid tellin him bout the goings on of a town he was headed to seemed like a fine warning as any. God forgive him if he was wrong. "Seems... _messy_..."

" _Yep_ ," the kid popped its p, lips pursed in proper form. "But at least the Greysons are sending someone to fix it. Death that much deserves to be ended."

"You...don't _like_ that?" Blunt. Confused. Worried.

"Does a bear _shit_ in the woods sir?" The kid had bite, that was fair. "No harm meant by the language, but that was _dumb_. _No one_ likes death. Not even the Spooks."

"Fair 'nuff." Benny didn't really have the heart to tell it that he wasn't gon fix the issue so much as exacerbate it due to his employ being that of a Spook. That and he didn't have the guts to either. That damn kid spooked him something fierce.

The train continued to chug on and Benny gnawed on his lower lip. He didn't wanna be here and he for sure didn't wanna be here with this weird, scary fucking child, but he couldn't do jack about it. So he had to suffer. And he had to pretend he was fine with it.

He sure as shit _wasn't_ , but that's moot.

"Well, I can see that you're uncomfortable with me being here so...let me call it quits. See you later, sir." The kid stood up and dusted off their trousers. Then it gave Benny a toothy grin and it's slit-eyes squinched slightly. "Hope you solve your problem." Then it left Benny alone, walking off to the car behind him.

Benny let out a deep breath he hadn't known he was holding as the car door closed. " _Thank fuck_."

Benjamin Stands weren't a bad person, but he sure felt like he was being punished like one, coz the spectre of that kid lingered long after it left. He couldn't shake it.

And the train pulled to station. And he disembarked. And he never left that town alive. Seemed only right, apparently.

 


End file.
